Community Chat Rules Reminder

Discussion in 'Community Discussion' started by Krysyy, Jul 14, 2020.

  1. Community Chat Rules Reminder
    Since the addition of Community Chat, we've had some fantastic conversations and we've seen the community interact in fantastic ways. However, we've had some issues lately with chat, so this is a blanket reminder to all about the chat limits. A reminder will also run in-game to all players on an automatic schedule for a minimum of a few days until these issues are less prevalent and I feel that the point is driven home.

    Please note that this thread is being created by request of players who are bothered by this problem. It does not pertain to one particular situation, but many over the last couple of weeks which have and are continuing to be looked into. So as a reminder, the rule details are as follows:
    1. Keep EMC Clean and Friendly
    • Do not use inappropriate or vulgar words.
    • Do not discuss inappropriate or controversial topics in the Public Chat channels.
    • Do not be rude to other players.
    • Do not spam.
    • Do not use other languages in Public Chat
    • Do not ask other players for their personal (IRL) information.
    • Do not use inappropriate character skins.
    • Do not build anything inappropriate.
    • Do not cause public drama.
    • Do not advertise or mention other servers.

    If you have a problem with a topic in chat, or players are breaking the rules, please use /report to alert staff.
    You do not need to go and retrieve the staff from the server they are on. They will see the report in our system and will be able to handle the situation, sometimes without even logging on in-game. If a staff member does not handle the situation immediately and you feel comfortable doing so NICELY, you may ask for the player to stop breaking the chat rules. Please do not be rude or you could make the situation worse.

    Reporting Trolls
    If someone joins and you believe that they are trolling chat, please use /report and do not interact with the player. Many times the trolls are just looking for a reaction and when you give them one, it makes them troll harder. Staff will address the situation once they receive a report.

    Keeping Conversations Community Based in Community Chat
    If you are having an extensive discussion with your friend about your base, please do not do so in Community Chat. Everyone does not need to hear you and your friend discuss something that is specific to just you two. There are group and private messages for this use.

    Discussion of Inappropriate Topics
    Our rules are set by the concept of family friendly and we work very hard to maintain a safe atmosphere for our players. Recently, it's come to my attention that there were conversations which are definitely NOT family friendly going on in community chat. I'll be working with staff and we will be more actively taking action for these issues as they arise to better define as much as possible the cause of these issues. Parents shouldn't have any issues with our chat and recently I've had some complaints so it's a problem, and one I do not take lightly.

    Discussion of Politics is Controversial / COVID Talk
    Whether it's politic decisions, handling of pandemics, etc the discussion of politics is not something that we need to discuss on a game server. If you mention COVID in the way of speaking about your day in quarantine, or saying your favorite place is still shut down, etc that is fine. COVID is a part of every day life currently. However, we request that you do not discuss how countries are handling the situation or how immunity is, etc due to how dissenting opinions are over this topic and also because some people play Minecraft to NOT talk about what's going on 'out there' and for some it could be a very upsetting topic (especially if their family member is sick). If you wish to debate politics, you may do so in a private channel, such as group.

    If you have any questions about if a topic is considered family friendly or anything about the other rules, please ask me directly. I will tell you yes or no, as well as explain why. You may also post in this thread if it's appropriate to do so.

    My inbox is always open. Link: pmcm.emc.gs
  2. Yeah I had to mute chat for a bit due to how fast the chat was going. Was a little overwhelming for me

    A friendly reminder you can always do /chathide community if the chat is either 1. Is way too much chat or 2. There is a topic that you don't want to see

    Hope that helps others
    khixan, ProfessorNoob82, 607 and 4 others like this.
  3. Though if someone is hiding chat to not see a topic, perhaps the chat needs to be reviewed...
    Shouldn't need to hide chat in our community.
    JDHallows, 607 and Joy_the_Miner like this.
  4. I agree with all that was posted. I especially agree with the Politics/COVID-19 discussion. We already have dedicated threads for that on the EMC forums if they so choose to participate in those discussions. But in-game should almost always be Minecraft-related. :D

    To be honest, I wish there were a global setting for all servers to disable community chat if desired. But... at the same time, I've been on there and seen a bit, as well as a few friends of mine showing how... "colorful" the chat was starting to become. Doing that could make it harder to catch these people if everyone has community chat disabled. 💦

    Thanks for addressing this issue Kryssy. :)
  5. Yea, lately I've been seeing a lot more... interesting... topics coming up in the chat. Much of which have not been appropriate or helpful. And I really like the new system of chat (global), but yes,
    it can get overwhelming at times for sure. I am glad this has been brought up, thanks Krysyy. :)
  6. I have seen some interesting conversations (cough i may be to blame for one but I have taken responsibility for that sorry) all the interesting conversations that i have seen have been when mods are online and do nothing so im assuming its ok.

    But then again its nothing not family friendly so im sure its fine

    I think c chat becoming over welling could mainly be partly to the amount of messages that people receive in the community chat due to alot of players being chatty (again guilty)
    Sylenzo and Joy_the_Miner like this.
  7. A general thing that has been on my mind for a while: the term "family friendly" is quite vague and unclear to me. What is acceptable in some families, will be completely unacceptable in other families - both regarding the way of speaking and the subjects that are acceptable. I think that that will, in a natural way, make it harder for some people to automatically follow the desired guidelines for "family friendly" here. I don't know how to solve this, but I thought it was an interesting thing to bring up. :)

    Do you mean "/chathide t"? That hides town (community) chat, until you leave your current server. :)
    607 and Bunjimon348 like this.
  8. No, I mean a global toggle switch that does not reset when leaving a server. EMC seems to lack a feature for globally disabling the community chat without it resetting... :\
    607 likes this.
  9. I've never used it myself, but maybe "/c off" would work? :) - though that does turn off all chats. I've personally just made a shortcut for turning off chat. :p
    Alaenia likes this.
  10. It's already well defined in many bullet points what is not allowed and people continue doing so. Vagueness isn't the cause unless the person is purposefully ignoring the clarifications in front of their face on the rules page.
  11. That's with buildmode as well. You can always suggest it to always be on till you decide to turn it back on again
  12. The problem is not that I want it disabled by default, I want the server to remember what I set it to without me having to configure it every time I log back in to the server...

    (I could be wrong, but hiding c chat is also on a per-SMP basis, which is also quite disappointing...)
    607 likes this.
  13. Oops, I forgot about the list on the rules page - I thought everything relevant was posted here. :p You mean this list, I assume?

    "Do not discuss inappropriate or controversial topics in the Public Chat channels.
    *This includes, but is not limited to, the following:
    -Drugs (including recreational)
    -Alcohol
    -Sexual Activities
    -Politics
    -Religion
    -Sexuality
    -Illegal Activities
    -Breaking Server Rules
    -Racism
    -Sexism
    -Mental Health/Suicide"

    The unsolvable issue with this is the "but is not limited to" and the fact that it can at times be hard to see whether a topic fits in this list or not - and the way someone sees this can even differ per person. A bad example: say a nice history discussion about the 4th of July takes place. The general category would be history, but it could also be seen as fititng in politics and religion.

    I don't know how to solve this, but I do think that things like this at times will cause a seemingly normal conversation for some, while others may be bothered by it.

    ---

    Regarding the way of speaking, this is described in the following way: (shortened)

    "The use of mild language such as [...] is the most excessive language allowed"

    The "issue" with this is that the definition of mild/foul language differs per person/family. The first example of the not allowed censored word is perfectly normal in many groups I know, while the two allowed examples are seen as (slightly) worse.

    Again, I don't know how to fix this, but I do think that realising this helps with viewing the other people's perspective - what seems offensive to some, is perfectly normal to others, and the other way around as well.

    EDIT:
    It is indeed. :)
    Sylenzo and 607 like this.
  14. In my mind family friendly really means child friendly and I think most people have some awareness of what sort of discussions are appropriate to have in the presence of children.

    Personally I prefer that community chat is about in-game topics only. I think it's true that a lot of people spend time on EMC as a refuge from real life. I think you are right Krysyy pointing out that for many people Covid19 is having impacts in their real life and is a sensitive topic so it's best not talked about in community chat. I also think community chat is not the place to seek help with real life problems or overshare. Whatever challenges people face they definitely deserve support and love, but part of dealing with things is learning to find the right places and people to ask for help and advice and the appropriate contexts in which to raise issues. In-game community chat should be treated as if there are children in the room because normally there are.

    I have seen staff and players using discussion of food to try and return conversation to a "neutral" topic but ironically that is when I mute chat as health problems have made eating difficult for me lately and to me it is most definitely not a neutral or comfortable topic. I'm not saying I class it as an inappropriate topic or that I object at all to those discussions, I don't mind muting for a while, I'm just illustrating that some topics are sensitive to some people.

    If chat is mostly about Minecraft and EMC then it solves a whole lot of problems. There are many other spaces and places available for people to talk about whatever they want to talk about.
    607 likes this.
  15. Unless it's an EMC related server
    or
    Do not advertise or mention servers other than EMC connected servers

    Perhaps its not needed, I just felt it needed a distinction
  16. To state rather bluntly, the recent topics of conversation reported to me were VERY clearly listed as not allowed. Gray areas are one thing. This reminder isn't about those.
    Joy_the_Miner and Zbid like this.
  17. This has confused me since that clarification was added. :p I guess it's down to cultural differences? Still it's strange, as the USA do have a Christian history. But maybe they've got some really hefty poop-related trauma? :rolleyes:
    There's an easy fix though: just don't cuss at all. :) (or use your own words that would very unlikely be offensive to people, like I sometimes do :p)

    I think it's clear, I hope chat gets more light-hearted again. :)
    HazardousCode likes this.
  18. I haven't read every reply, but I also have chat disabled due to the pacing (mostly for my own computer's sake, the less text/gaphics I have to deal with, the easier a time this computer seems to have running Minecraft). I will admit though, that the primary reason I turned it off was due to an instance in which my religion (Pagan) was called the devil's path and that I was going to hell. That person was muted, but their friends started jumping on the bandwagon. I've had chat off since then.

    I will turn it back on for Minecraft related questions, but those questions get missed in among the banter back and forth - usually topics restricted to the forums. So off it goes and back to the net I go.

    I am grateful, Krysyy, that you're reiterating that community chat in game and on the server is for Minecraft - not politics, COVID, etc.

    I personally would like to go back to having my chat on at some point again like I used to, and have Minecraft be the happy, fun, build-with-digital-Legos time it's supposed to be - not doom, gloom, we's-a-gonna-die! that it has been lately when I've turned chat on.
  19. So no spamming 1r payments till I get kicked lol
    Alaenia likes this.
  20. I still can’t get over the fact that in one day (before this reminder and messaging in game) there were three trolls that join the game at the same time, all new and every time I staff came online they didn’t do anything. But then a staff leaves they started to act up. Two staffs left. Then they have got banned..then two more joined and was spamming the chats. Still amaze me that two staffs didn’t notice anything but BurgerKnight did..he had to keep muting them over and over again 😓 it was a show that couldn’t be missed.
    KatydidBuild likes this.